The Best Homemade Fried Mac & Cheese Sliders

Best Homemade Fried Mac & Cheese Sliders

Fried Mac & Cheese Sliders

Have you ever met someone that didn’t like mac and cheese sliders, let alone not like fried mac & cheese? If you have met someone like this, I’d say “Run” something has to be wrong with that person, j/k 🙂 Fried cheese has to be up there with one of the world’s most decadent foods. So hey, why not fry up some mac and cheese and see how it goes. I can report it goes all the way to flavor–town. The key to the fried mac & cheese sliders is the homemade cheese sauce. The cheese, the cheese sauce is called Mornay; which is also known as a white sauce with cheese added. Bechamel is one of the 5 mother sauces in French cooking. If you have never made a Bechamel sauce before today, then today is the day. In the video, I made sure to slow things down to show the exact timing used for making the cheese sauce. Cause, hey, it’s only the most important part. This recipe is just plain fun. Your kids will be beyond excited to just hear the words Mac & Cheese

With our busy lives sometimes making a homemade sauce like a bechamel isn’t in the game plan. Certainly, not a big deal other than the homemade bechamel flavor and texture is superior to the mac & cheese from the box. I still love the mac & cheese from the box lol. Grew up eating the awesome tastiness from that blue box. The recipe still works both ways, homemade or boxed. So don’t worry, fried mac and cheese sliders are totally in your future.

Star Ingredients For Fried Mac & Cheese Sliders

You could honestly use whatever ingredients you like. The key is the consistency of the sauce. You do not want a loose sauce or the mac and cheese will not set up nicely in the refrigerator. When you cut the mac and cheese into the size you want, it needs to be firm. No worries, just watch the video below and you’ll be good to go.

Boil water and add one tablespoon of sea salt. Cook the pasta to the doneness the bag or box suggests. It's about 6 minutes. Iron Chef Mario Batali suggests cooking the pasta one minute less than the box or bag suggests.

Cook for one minute. Next start adding the whole milk. Start off slowly making sure to incorporate the milk well. The consistency will tighten up. Once this starts to happen add in a little bit more whole milk. Repeat till the texture of the sauces is a little bit loose. The addition of the cheese will tighten the sauce up quickly.

Add cheese and stir until smooth. Add cheese sauce to the drained pasta and combine.

Lastly, pour the mac and cheese into a casserole dish lined with parchment paper ( easy removal ) or whatever you have that will create enough depth to make slider-shaped cuts later.

Cool the mac and cheese for 15 minutes, then refrigerate for one hour.

Cut the mac and cheese to the size that will fit the slider buns you bought.

Frying

Use a standard breading procedure

First flour the mac and cheese slider, next into the beaten egg, lastly into panko bread crumbs or traditional breadcrumbs. The panko will give you a bigger crunch factor.

Recipe Video

Best Homemade Fried Mac & Cheese Sliders

Frying Tip

When frying the macaroni, don’t overcrowd the pot or you’ll lower the temperature too much and the macaroni won’t get as crispy. Also, don’t use too big of a pot or you’ll need more oil and when the temperature drops from adding each piece it will take a longer amount of time to recover to the fry temperture of 350-375.

Macaroni/ˌmækəˈroʊni/ is a variety of dry pasta traditionally shaped into narrow tubes,[2] produced in various shapes and sizes. Originating in Italy[1] and made with durum wheat, macaroni is commonly cut in short lengths; curved macaroni may be referred to as elbow macaroni. Some home machines can make macaroni shapes, but like most pasta, macaroni is usually made commercially by large-scale extrusion. The curved shape is created by different speeds of extrusion on opposite ends of the pasta tube as it comes out of the machine.

In North America, the word “macaroni” is often used synonymously with elbow-shaped macaroni, as it is the variety most often used in macaroni and cheese recipes.[3] In Italy, the noun maccheroni refers to straight, tubular, square-ended pasta corta (“short-length pasta”). Maccheroni may also refer to long pasta dishes such as maccheroni alla chitarra and frittata di maccheroni, which are prepared with long pasta like spaghetti.

Another Fun Cheese Recipe From Butter-n-Thyme

Chef Steven Pennington

Content Creator

Le Cordon Bleu Chef sharing food adventures from around the world with a style of cooking rooted in southwestern flavors using French culinary technique.